Once More, with Feeling!

"Who is queen?"

2009-02-12T20:36:00.002-05:00

"I don't think you're even capable of saying a bad word about anyone."
"I'm Italian-Irish-German. Trust me, I can be vindictive." I don't tell them that I am that special insidious sort of vindictive. The kind that uses sugar, spice, and everything nice. The kind that plays comely and kindly and then turns it into the most intimate of personal embarrassments. It is one thing to insult someone with words-- it is another to prove such accusations true.
"No," he said "No, I don't buy it. You're vindictive like... you're vindictive like a kumquat!"
"What does that even mean?" I ask through my laughter. Kumquats are not anything remotely approaching emotive, let alone vindictive.
"I don't know" he says, "But it fits. You're like the Kumquat Queen"
"Then I wouldn't mess with me" I said
"Touche. But you're still not vindictive. You can't be."

I don't know what made me think of that today. But then, when does one ever think of a kumquat except to make it a figure of speech or the butt of a joke?

Memo:

2009-01-02T23:52:00.002-05:00

To: Arizona Drivers

From: Me

Regarding: Your driving "skillz"

Now, I consider myself a patient girl. I have endured California drivers, Massachusetts drivers, New Hampshire drivers, and the occasional Maine/Vermont driver. I endured tourista season in San Diego with valiant effort. And yet, I find myself facing the toughest challenge yet: your driving.

A few helpful reminders:

The limit line is, in fact, NOT the line furthest from you. That's the edge of the cross walk. You know, where all those pesky pedestrians can often be found? Yeah, stopping at that line in the middle of the biggest/busiest intersection in town when you're in the left hand turn lane? It's what we call "recipe for disaster"
Speaking of that left hand turn lane? So not necessary to nearly run me over in that lane on your way to the lane furthest to the right in your direction of travel.
Turn signals-- look into it. They aren't just for decoration anymore!
Riding my ass (metaphorically speaking) will not make me go faster. The fact that you would like to go 50 mph in a school zone is not my problem.
Please do not blast loud rap or R&B near my mother. I'm not going to be held responsible for her rolling down all the windows and blasting NPR or Bach right back at you. It's embarrassing for all of us.
Red means stop. Green means go. Yellow means get your ass out of my way.
A neighborhood street being undivided does not mean that you get to drive down the middle.
Pulling out into the middle of the road and stopping in the face of oncoming traffic? Well, let's just say it also falls under "recipe for disaster"
You do not, by divine right, birth right, Constitutional right, or any other right, possess the power to always go first. Nor can you always run stop signs or red lights. This is how bad things happen.
Traffic laws are not something that can or should be protested. Just live with it.
A side note: running over the barista on your way to get into Starbucks isn't really going to help you get your coffee. In fact, it will generally impede that activity. So knock it off.

Hopefully you'll all remember these hints in the future so that my blood pressure can return to normal and I can start sweating the small stuff again. Oh hell, it's the desert, I'd like to get back to just normal sweating with no cause other than the weather.

You know you love me,
XOXO,
Coffee girl

Odds and ends and brick-a-brac

2008-12-18T18:32:00.004-05:00

I've disappeared for a month or so, not that that's unusual. For all the time I spend on the internet, I do not think as much as I once did. Perhaps it's my day job-- I can explain the difference between a latte and a cappuccino, why french presses are better, why loose leaf tea is the way to go, why an iced cappuccino is somewhere between heresy and a desire for food poisoning, and so on forever. I can also tell you that the harder the economic times get, the meaner customers get, as though the baristas are personally responsible for their consistent wasting of money in all manner of "must haves" that aren't so crucial anymore. I can even start to talk about what went wrong in the economy, though not very well (it's an expansion on the theme of "who watches the watchmen" if you care). But thinking? Honest to goodness thinking? It doesn't come up very often for me anymore.

I've officially finished my first semester of library school. Not what one might call though provoking, maybe, but it isn't supposed to be. I mean, you are more than welcome to try and come up with a replacement for MARC21 or the Library of Congress Subject Headings (fat chance it'll catch on). But to do that you need a certain amount of time working in the field. What seems good on paper may not be in practice, and you won't know until you've worked as a librarian. So I went about my studies, and learned all about cataloging and collection development and research methods (perhaps the least helpful of my classes because it was all repetition of my Stats class a few years ago-- but with bonus ideology).

You know, the library world is a funny thing. It is at once focused on innovations and integrating the latest computer technology into the library and not moving a muscle from the established status quo. Which, I'll be honest, is befuddling. I understand the drive to get more twenty-somethings into libraries. They use it, they'll teach their kids to use it, etc etc etc. However, TELLING the twentysomethings that are entering the field that they couldn't possibly understand the demands of the twentysomething is ludicrous. So I'm young. So what? I've been computer literate since I was 4, internet savy since I was 6, and marketing myself since I hit school. My experience is most certainly valid-- I'm the kid with the iPod, the RSS feeds, the blog, and more-- all simultaneous activities no less. It appears that, somewhere along the line, the libraries forgot that they were a part of the service sector. I'm not busting out a "Just say Yes" policy (that, by the way, is the way that spectacular failure and disgruntled empolyees lies... from my observations). I simply wonder if libraries could listen, just a little bit, to their constiuents. The fact that they're run by the government doesn't mean they have to try to live up to the stereotype of a government agency. I mean really...

There's all kinds of business going on at my fair alma, though I'm sure everyone who reads this already knows. I'll try not to say I told you so, but I will ply you with arguments similar to those I make to the libraries-- the fact that recent graduate are, in fact, only 22 or 23 does not invalidate their observations, opinions, struggles, etc. My class seems to have been locked out by everyone: admin, alumni, everyone. And quite frankly, we wrote home, we tried to tell people that something was rotten in the state of Denmark. And we were called liars, and anarchists, and moles, and uncharitable, and every rotten name in the book. All of a sudden we were every villain of every piece ever read at that school. And all I have to say is-- we were right. You think we're a bunch of scum bags who lie for shits and giggles? We were trying to save the place that was onnly just turning us loose on a wide world, a place that was shifting right out from under us as we stumbled out into a ruthless world with nobody to watch us. And we were nothing, less than dirt. Well, if things go further south? It's not because we didn't try-- it's because no one else did. And with that, I leave it behind me. It's like ripping out part of my heart-- my graduation, which should have been so happy, was a boot up my ass to get me out of there. I was already forgotten. I'm just returning the favor.

Your monthly-ish Founding Father's reminder:

2008-11-15T15:31:00.002-05:00

This month? Well, let's let the first amendment speak for itself, shall we?
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances"

That would be verbatim, my friends. As in, I copy pasted the stupid thing from the Library of Congress web edition of the Constitution. Now, what do we notice is missing? Could that be the phrase "Separation of Church and State?" Why yes, it is.

I could wax poetic and non-poetic on the virtues and vices of the Constitutional Convention, the politcal theory of several founding fathers, the whys and wherefores of why the Constitution is written the way it is, but for now, I'll stick with the 1st amendment.

For those in need of a US Government refresher, the Constitution was originally signed and published without a Bill of Rights in 1787. The majority of states passed in in fall 1787 and winter/spring 1788, culminating in the establishment of the current US Government March 4th, 1788. This is all sans Bill of Rights. Now the question many of you may ask is why? We hold these rights to be fundamental. Well, to borrow from Constitutional proponents, it was because all the protection any American could hope for was contained in the preamble. Obviously, this didn't pass legal muster, and the Bill of Rights was passed piecemale up to 1791 (which is when we hit amendment 11).

The Founders didn't include the Bill of Rights, including amendment 1, in the original Constitution (and trust me, I've read the debates and notes of the Convention. These were men concerned with the utility of government as well as the freedom of the people, and making sure that the one ensured the other. They were worried about the actual STRUCTURE of government). Do you know why the Bill of Rights was passed? As a protection against government.

Seperation of Church and State-- the very phrase implies that the State has something to fear of the Church, that the legal protection is OF the state, not FROM the state. Let's face it people, if the founder's thought that the Church needed protection from the State at a time when the Church had more authority then now (not a lot, just more than now), why on EARTH do we feel the need to "Protect ourselves and the government" from religion?

"Congress shall make no law regarding the establishment of a church or the free practice thereof"-- that doesn't check your religion at the door, that doesn't mean that someone who follows a religion should leave all that that means out of their decisions when the vote, be they citizen or representative. And for the record? That is why the Roman Church is threatening to excommunicate politicans that support activities that fundamentally undermine all that the Church is. Because if this whole government is about talking and debating and sussing things out, then why should we say "I personally believe but that has nothing to do with anything." There comes a balancing point, between dictating that all laws be in compliance with a single religion, and trying to destroy all religion.

I guess there's one example, and its recent, that bothers me most when it comes to this. The Freedom of Choice Act, among its many stipulations, says that any doctor MUST perform abortion on demand, that no hospital can refuse abortion on demand. What does that do to the free exercise of religion on behalf of those doctors, nurses, hospital workers? What does it do the free exercise of state sovereignty? The bishops are threatening to close obstetrics units over this. How scary is that? Because the amendment designed to protect their RIGHT to practice religion has been turned on its ear, and now they must sacrifice all that they are as a religious person to serve those who demand pure secularization. Makes me scared, more than anything. It should scare you too.

The audacity of questioning

2008-10-31T13:00:00.002-04:00

I have always been a questioning sort. Not in the "how does this work?" sort of way. I'm like Mindy from Anamaniacs, I just keep asking "Why?" My whole life I've run into people who were willing to question why things were, what they were, why they existed. As I look back, I realize that most of these people were outside mainstream academia, something that should explain why I sit where I sit now in grad school. It doesn't.

I have a class, Research Methods, which is very heavily grounded in ideology. And no, I don't mean that there's a background idea that weaves its way through the course. I mean ideology as in the dangerous kind, as in an idea that grabs hold of people to the point that their world view is entirely determined by the ideology. You know, the scary kind. In this case, its Italian socialism mixed with bits of Marx mixed with good old fashioned American know how and pushing things to the nth degree. It's certainly interesting, and outside my normal purview. For the sake of my grade, I haven't questioned this within the confines of the class. I have, however, spent the entire semester questioning the why and wherefore. It's a personal growth thing.

Perhaps that's why I was so shocked when the undercurrent I had detected in the comments flared out in the most awkward of ways. One of the students decided to hold forth on the fact that questioning isn't natural, that all of us are preconditioned to NOT question, and that we must learn how. This came from a student who has been nothing but dogmatic on many many issues, not the least of which was a debate with me over the usage of the word "hegemony." It gets me thinking again of how lucky I am, and how screwed we as a society are.

I'm lucky because I have been left to my natural inclination, ie, questioning. Aristotle says that man is, by nature, a political animal. That may be, but I think man is, by nature, a curious animal as well. How much do we prize inovation and invention? What marks a small child as annoying but their insatiable curiousity? Curiousity begats questioning which generally begats thinking. And man is marked by his thought-- what else distinguishes him from the other animals?

And this preconditioning thing-- my colleagues act as though it is nature, when it is the opposite. It's unnatural, it's not good, and its everywhere. It's also how ideologies take hold-- if there is but one school of thought that promises everything you ever wanted and an answer to the evils in the world wouldn't you take it? No difficulty, no pain, just an answer to the questions that you keep trying to supress. How wonderful. And so people stop questioning, and start being lemmings.

I'm sure you all know where that leads to. It's more than just different schools of thought. It's why people of radical political persuations can truly not understand someone with a different view point; it's outside the system so its outside the world.It just frightens me that so many people agreed with her assesment: that people think we are naturally sheep, uninquiring beings who simply live because we are waiting to die. If an entire society has entered that mind set that isn't it too simply living because it is waiting to die? Scary thought.

2008-10-13T22:32:00.002-04:00

I've been silent for many weeks now, mainly because I had three rather large projects all due the same day (this past Friday). It was a good thing I did. Prior to those projects, I had felt very discouraged about library school. I felt that I was left to my own devices overmuch, that the lectures were less helpful and more about professorial idiosyncrasies. It took me a few weeks, but I realized that they have finally shown me enough resources that I can do this stuff myself. One can decide to learn, be eager to learn, but without tools that desire often becomes frustrated.

For example, I can now expound the difference between Dublin Core metadata encoding, and MARC encoding. I can tell you how Dublin Core fits into METS, sort of the updated version of MARC with many many fewer fields. I have actively found and developed an outline for the collection development policy for a special collection of web documents. And I remember all the stats stuff I once knew.

All this to say? Academia got me so down I forgot what my purpose was. This is utilitarian knowledge, but not in the bad, decried sense. This is knowledge that leads to reasoning that hopefully leads to showing people where and how to find the knowledge and truth they seek. And that means something.

Hopefully it means I've turned a corner, that from here on I will salvage an education meant strictly to be utilitarian. I've got some time to do it. On Wednesday, I return to NH for a brief engagment (ha ha, if ONLY). Hopefully I'll get some pictures up on here to share with all five of you who check in every once in a while

Stop, look, listen, think about what's going on

2008-09-20T15:06:00.002-04:00

Props to anyone who remembers the PSA that the titular ditty is from (rock on 90's cartoon PSAs!)

This, however, is not a PSA about keeping the peace and being strong. It's simply this: Government! Yes you, whom I pay taxes to, who repairs my roads, who keeps me safe in war and peace, yes you. Cease with the bailouts! The mortgage situation, in large part, is a bed made by us and now we lie in it. Lying, in fact, is what got us there. Remember, my mother's brokerage specializes in loss mitigation and loan renegotiation. I'm not just some outsider, I'm on the ground floor of this business, and I'm telling you this: people's own greed, stupidity, decietfulness, and vice is what got us here. People decided they were entitled to the American dream without a second's worth of work; they believed that a house and a Hummer and a Sea Doo and designer clothes should fall into their laps because of the (perceived) cleaverness of them. That's not the way it works, and that's not actually the American dream.

The American dream? That's what you're stealing from me by ponying up trillion's of dollars to save the people who lied about their income, their work, their life, and their needs to get a giant house they couldn't afford. The American Dream, simply stated, is that you get what you give. You work? You can get where you want to go. You don't work? You'll get some help, because we look out for each other, but you don't get a damn McMansion. You get tools, not the fish or the damn fleet.

But guess who now gets to fund the bail out of your fabulous home? Me. The girl who pays her taxes, who's making 7.90 an hour at STARBUCKS and trying to get a Master's degree and trying beyond all reason to get herself closer to her fiance. My parents, who try as hard as they can to keep a roof over our heads, who try to stay out of debt, who work until 3 am and get up again at 8am and keep going. We don't have uber nice things: there isn't a designer dress or shoe in this house, we drive a Camry and Corolla, not a Beemer. But we eat well, and we can afford a bottle of wine with dinner, and we can sit at the table for hours and talk when we have that luxery. We don't buy the latest iPhone, or computer. We buy generic a lot of times because the name brand isn't worth the extra four bucks. And you know what this whole economic crunch has made me realize? That as much of pain in the ass as that lifestyle may appear, it's wonderful. At no point was I any more worried about economics then I ever have been (we watch CNBC in this house, it's not like I'm ever not worried). I havn't feared losing my house, or my way of life. We live, and we delight in simple things-- my hobby is cross stitch, which is a whopping 35 cents to fund (per color of course). We read books, we borrow movies from the library. We take advantage of the one thing that government does really well. Local government has always been about being the closest to the people, to making sure that they're taken care of. Part of that? All sorts of low cost or free stuff. Libraries, pilates, free movie nights, all sorts of community events that you already paid for through your taxes.

You remember all those old stories of village parties and town square fairs? How people came together and just hung out? How they were both self sufficient and part of the community? Why not just update it? There's no reason that it should be limited like it was then. Bring everyone in. Here's where idealism takes over. If you actually interact with people in the community-- people of ALL types, races, religions, ethnicities, tax brackets-- you might find that some social issues ease. If you're my friend you're my friend, and I don't give a damn about the rest. If you annoy me, well, take comfort in the fact that it's likely just clashing personalities and not a deeper problem (I told you idealism). In the meantime, don't take the money for that away so that you can save a bunch of liars and cheats the "indignity" of having to do an honest day's work.

You know what grinds my gears?

2008-09-15T14:14:00.004-04:00

I seriously cannot fathom basing Library Science/Information studies research on Marxist theory. I can't. I don't see why anyone would WANT to. I don't understand why Marx's substructure/superstructure works as a basis for research and the libraries when, quite frankly, it doesn't exist as he imagined it to in the real world. It certainly doesn't exist when taken out of his whole theory.

I mean, certainly things are culturally determined, but the superstructure was everything: state, church, family, personal relationships, academia (hint, hint, yo). If we base ourselves in that superstructure aren't we admitting that we are participating in something that is alienating man from himself, that our work is simply ephemeral and will pass away with all of the world as we know it when the revolution comes? Of course not, because we take only the idea of substructure, superstructure, and cultural hegemony. We also should think capitalism is evil, but I'll be you that none of these people have considered that Marx is probably rolling in his grave that the INSTITUTIONS of man's alienation are now trying to pick and choose his theory. I mean, give the man some respect and leave his theory intact. Geez.

Why academia, well, sucks.

2008-09-13T21:37:00.002-04:00

It was a secret hidden well from me. My parents did it on purpose, the faculty of Thomas More saw it as something to be avoided at all costs. The secret I speak of is typical academia's attitude toward their students. Quite simply, they assume that you are rock stupid and unable to comprehend anything so well as they. Prodigies are acceptable only in grade school, perhaps high school. Beyond that, the professor knows all and you can only hope to achieve a measure of his greatness.
I was so blissfully ignorant going into my Master's program. I assumed that, along with being able to address your professors by first name came a certain amount of respect, if for no other reason than that you survived the undergraduate days and decided that pushing forward was a good idea. This idea was quickly knocked out of me after I left 504, "Librarian Boot Camp." I expected Drill Sergeants for profs and I got nice people. This, I was told, was the norm. I could expect earnest people who sought to impart wisdom. I should have known better than to expect the Boomer generation to think anyone could touch them, let alone learn.

Now before you say "But your profs at TMC were boomers!" they really aren't. Dr. Sampo is the "Greatest Generation," Drs. Fahey, Nelson, and Blum are too young to be in the Boomer generation. I think they fall between Gen X and Boomers, which I count as a good thing. I suppose that Dr. Mumbach qualifies, but she always stuck me as ageless, so I'll let it slide. So you see, I escaped there. Now I find myself faced with them, full on. There's something about the Boomer generation I just don't understand. Perhaps it's because they, in many ways, had it the best of all the generations we're dealing with now. They got the 50's ideal, they were the first generation that could really afford superfluous things like nice cars or vacations. And I think it went to their heads.

There are also a lot of them. They run just about everything, because the baby boom was so large. If I had even a dime for every time I endured a snide remark because of my youth (and thus, my perceived stupidity), I would be able to retire now a wealthy woman. This attitude of superiority is only worsened with the title "Professor." A PhD seems to confer a false sense of superiority that enables it's bearer to look down their nose at everyone younger than them, regardless of actual ability, intelligence, or qualities. As part of this, it is apparently necessary to assign readings that insult the basic intelligence of any person with the ability to use their brain. If you disagree with the article, clearly you are in the wrong because several of the author's colleagues reviewed the article and it was published! Have you been published? Therefore you are in no position to judge good research from bad!

The fact of the matter is that, despite my 22 years, I AM in a position to judge. I have read a large chunk of Western Canon. I have done an in depth study of a legal system which is nothing if not complex, and if you think that doesn't involve research you underestimate the project. I have performed analysis on political philosophies, literary interpretations, and plain old fashioned philosophy for four years. I have written, presented, and defended my study of common law and was complimented on my work by no less than a "Who's who" of Notre Dame Alumni, a man who holds two Master's degrees from Oxford, and an incredibly accomplished and published literary critic. And they were the least scary of the 100 person panel to whom I presented and defended my thesis. I did a semester long study of one man's political theory, a man who designed the American Executive and the Electoral College, as well as the man who took 20 resolutions and formed them into a document that would become the US Constitution. Hardly an easy study to do, and I did it, and did it well. Age is not a factor, accomplishment is. Even without a PhD, I can find an article insultingly simple and wrong.

A few highlights:

Making "Hegemony" equivalent with political myth, sociology, and "acceptance."
The 'pluralist paradigm'-- the idea that all groups within a given social science can have a paradigm, that each of these paradigms is in fact a paradigm, that each is equally valuable, and that this lack of consensus is in fact a STRENGTH
That having no dominant group within a society can constitute an hegemony
That the values of America are applicable to an international field as its base (btw? Fact chance that anyone else will agree with you on that)
That the world can be "falsely imagined as a realm of facts independent of the knower." Moreover, they think that this means the same thing as not taking research out of context. If you're going to follow Hume, follow Hume and say you don't know the sun is gonna rise tomorrow. Don't do this weird side step watoosie that doesn't actually say anything.
That the best way to understand research in library science is a Hegelian-Marxist-Neitzchan idea.
Non canonical theory-- if it's in a book, it's canon. If it's canon, it had a maker. If it had a maker, it is automatically ideological in the worst sense and should be ignored, repudiated, and destroyed.
Political economy and sociology? Totally the same thing.

I've still got 10 or so more pages, but I just can't make it. I cannot read through more of this. I cannot sit there and pretend that any of this is true or good or relevant. That's the kicker. This class is about RESEARCH, and apparently this means that we have to find what's wrong with everything according to our only socially constructed ideological bent. I guess I don't mind the ideology so much; it's the fact that the article claims it's uncovering it that bothers me. It's almost worse when you consider that they made a sort of shepherd's pie out of the major modern and and postmodern ideologies and called it fresh and new.

In the words of lolcats? UR DOING IT WRONG

In defense of words

2008-09-10T15:44:00.004-04:00

I'm not touching the political mess that is the November General Election, simply because while it is rife with examples of the importance of words, I can't find my hip waders and I refuse to enter the muck without them. This whole train of thought stems from my graduate work.

One of my classes this semester is Organization of Information. That seems to be pretty self explanatory right? How information is organized for retrieval. Easy as pie. Buried deep in my lecture was a note: Don't get hung up on the use of "bibliographic" to describe non-books. The term doesn't matter because we'll use it how we use it.

WHAT?!?!?!?!

For starters, I understand that bibliographic is a word that has undergone evolution-- books as such didn't really exist in Greece. However, in English, bibliography is regarding books. It's the way that Greek translates into English. No one will argue that. There's this underlying idea that the word as such doesn't matter, simply how we use it.

Words don't work like that. They just don't. If you use bibliography to mean everything but books, how will anyone know? You're violating the inherent meaning of the word. More importantly, how exactly do you intend to communicate with anyone? If words mean only what you choose them to mean, and what I choose them to mean, then how do we ever reach consensus? Realistically, politics is the perfect example of the chaos of subjective word meaning. Words have inherent meaning-- they have to. To say that you can change them at the drop of a hat, the better to fit your personal meaning is ludicrous.

Librarianship isn't the only field guilty of this particular offense, its just the one I'm in at the moment. Precision of language has fallen by the wayside, something outdated like doing your own work and realizing that you are not the center of the universe. The problem is that it shouldn't be: being exact in language shouldn't be an option for those who care.

2008-08-29T01:12:00.002-04:00

May I say, for the record, that I am sick and tired of hearing people blame everyone except for themselves for certain problems of their own making. The recent housing crunch is due, in large part, to unethical practices it's true. There were lots of people who were given loans that they did not and should not have qualified for, or loans that were not designed for them. The fact that they could get such a raw deal is sad. Beyond that? Where's the personal responsibility? I'd love a house, sure, but I'm not ENTITLED to it. I'm not. I'm not ENTITLED to JACK SHIT, outside of the basic respect and human dignity accorded to every human being on this planet. Beyond that, I make my own way. It's the American myth-- the American dream is not simply that you will have plenty. It is that you can make that plenty yourself.

Why are you owed anything? Why do you think you are entitled to whatever car you want, and whatever house you want, and the designer clothes that you want, and all your petty WANTS? The fact of the matter is that you ARN'T. We are entitled to a right to live-- to live with the ability to chose, the ability to live with the choices we make. We are entitled to all that it means to be human. And guess what? That doesn't mean a mansion, a hummer, designer clothes. We ARE a nation of whiners, folks. For every upstanding, upright strong person there are four people who sit on their asses and BITCH about how they've been given a raw deal. For every person like me, who puts up with shit at work and shit at school and shit at home all in the name of the hope and prayer of a better life, there are the rest of my classmates, who go into debt not because they have to but because they want something shiny. I am the ONLY person who is going into debt for my grad school education out of necessity among my classmates. Every one else is going into more debt then me because they want cars and laptops and new clothes and everything else that they've been told that they absolutely have to have.

Quite frankly, neither candidate supports me. Neither candidate gives a rat's ass about a poor white girl who's got some brains who wants to get somewhere with her life. A lot of Republicans go "Do it yourself, and we won't help you." Democrats go "Sucks to be you, but you're white therefore you must have means therefore we will push you out of the few things that you have to give it to other people." And frankly? I have a shit job, and I barely got my college degree because I'm a poor girl. And you wonder why I hate the ideological politics of today. Because you can blind the many, but the people that you screw will NEVER forgive you. I cannot forgive ANY of the politicians from either side of the aisle that decided that I was not worth it. And quite frankly? It's all of you. The forgotten Americans are few I suppose, but we're still here. We're still your constituency. And we get ignored because we don't matter for your damn schema. I felt like throwing up during the Democratic National Convention. The same will be true of the Republican Convention. For God's sake, why is it so adversarial? If you're not with us you're against us. Sure, great, fine, wonderful, but did you ever think that there are people who are being abandoned to pick up the scraps that fall and you're ignoring them because they arn't vocal enough for your liking?

2008-08-28T15:04:00.003-04:00

If I thought I had a public to dissapoint, I would apologize for the long lapses between blog entries. However, I'm fairly certain I don't, so I don't feel the need. Sorry ^_^

Library school kicked off officially this week. I was ready: I had my notebooks, my textbooks, my loose leaf paper, my pens and pencils, and my mind was fairly itching for something more stimulating than the debate over how much ice should really go into a frappucino. And what I got was... underwhelming. Perhaps it's four years of the 'hit the ground running' mentality of Thomas More (The first 200 pages of Dostoyevsky's the Possessed: go) but I find "read the syllabus and post a hello message on the discussion board" to be a waste of an entire week. We only have 14 of them after all.

Outside of all that? The few things that I really truly want to explore I haven't been able to. However, I might be getting a kick start on those, one I don't mind sharing. Since most of you are aware of my Junior Project on James Wilson, I'll spare long winded explanations. Simply put, there are only 2 books that have been written about him. Ever. In the 200+ year history of this country. There are more books about Gouverneur Morris and exactly how well is he known? Not that he doesn't deserve the attention. If you've ever marveled at the simple poetic natrue of the Constitutional Preamble, you can thank Morris for it. My point being, Wilson is largely seen as the author of the Executive and the Electoral College, the second most powerful man at the Constitutional Convention behind Madison, was one of the original Supreme Court justices, spurred the 11th amendment on with a single judicial decision, compiled the first comprehensive overview of American Law, and was the 2nd law professor in the whole COUNTRY. And no one knows who he is. So it has been suggested to me that I write a book about this poor man who's theory was so important and who has been forgotten by history because of the unforgivable sin of wanting to be rememberd and falling into debt through land speculation. It'll take at least 5 years because I'm so piecemeal, but I think I'm going to do it. Nifty, huh?

The things they don't tell you about in school...

2008-08-11T21:02:00.004-04:00

Another title for this entry could be "Why Hegemony Matters." If you look up hegemony in the dictionary, you'll like find that it comes from the Greek for leadership, and that it's generally used in terms of parties or countries that are trying to exert power. It's a decent definition, but one that doesn't quite encompass the whole meaning, as I was taught.

Hegemony is much more than leadership. Most of the time, it carries with it a racial connotation, though that's not a "must have." It involves a people who feel they have a right to certain lands, or that certain peoples are in fact part of their people. It's a difficult concept for American's to get their heads around-- small wonder, when our society is so scattered that the idea of not having an overarching identity is heralded as a landmark and the "strength of the nation." Europe has a similar loathing of self, but it's in constant conflict with the very ancientness of the land-- the French, the Germans, the English are all people who have existed in their spots of land for a very, very long time. Those of you who have some familiarity with the time between World War I and World War II will have hint of what I aim for. Many of Hitler's earlier conquests, including the Rhineland and Austria, were achieved because of this idea. Both lands were seen as inherently German-- people, land, culture, language.

However, of all the nations in all the world, perhaps none have such strong ideas of self and hegemony as China and Russia. China I'm leaving out of this particular entry, because it seems that people have finally realized that the Chinese are very much self-determined: they are Chinese, and with that comes race, religion, culture, language and history that directly affects the Chinese psyche of past, present, and future. Hopefully the Olympics will showcase some of the lighter, more awe inspiring moments of Chinese history, and the beauty that still remains in the culture.

Russia, on the other hand, is another story. By now, many of you will have heard that Russia has entered the sovereign territory of the Republic of Georgia, on the night of the Olympic opening ceremonies. This was in response to rebel forces which were attempting to reclaim Georgian territory which they feel is theirs, while maintaining that they are not Georgian. The whole thing is a bit of a mess, but there's one thing that people keep missing. The simple fact of the matter is that NOT everyone thinks like an American. In fact, only Americans think like Americans. We have enough in common with Western Europe that there are usually few problems, but beyond that? Russia is a great country-- they've had culture longer than most, they have their own identity which is totally different than ours. That's not to say it's good or bad, it simply IS. Yet most of the world is going into the situation trying to deal with it like it's just another western country that got a little power hungry. That's not it at all-- it's a matter of culture, and place, and language, a yes a touch of race. It is something that we can't ever really understand. I've studied English culture and law and myth. That doesn't mean I understand it like someone who was raised in it, who has indisputable blood ties to the very core of understanding that exists within it.

As an analogue that more of my audience is likely to understand, I offer you... the cowboy. Who outside of America understands the American symbol of the cowboy loping over the hills, the "up by your bootstraps" mentality? To them it's John Wayne-- realistically, John Wayne just did it best for film. That idea, that lone wolf help others mentality is old, as old as the country itself. And you don't have to be a genius to figure out that the rest of the world doesn't get it. They have no reason to. That's why it's the "American myth" not the "Human myth." Does it participate in the human myth? Sure. The same is true of Russia. Almost more than you'd think-- 3rd Rome is part of both of our psyches. Along with that goes a whole lot more that is inherently Russian.

I have pride in my country, I do. Despite the fact that I'm taught I must loathe it, despite the fact that there is a lot worth loathing, I have affection and pride for my country. Russia was told by the world to loathe the USSR. Loathe it I'm sure they did. But the USSR wasn't Russia, not really. So how exactly does one deal with a people who have a wholly unique psychic understanding of themselves? It isn't by appealing to the things that the West holds dear. Russia is neither west nor east-- they are Russia. It's just the way it is.

The end is just the beginning...

2008-08-07T19:07:00.003-04:00

So they say at least. As of 2pm today, I'm done with the face to face portion of IRLS 504, "Librarian Boot Camp." Most of my graduating classmates are winding down summer, or working. Summer has been over for me since before it began. I spent the early part of my summer fighting to get into grad school, then working to make enough money to go to grad school. And my grad school started in July. It's both good and bad. My prgram requires twice as many credits as the average Master's program. So you can see that I'm feeling a little...overaught, especially when reminded of the great summers had by all the people I know. I'm trying to overcome that, but it's just not working.

On the other hand, I haven't got time to feel sorry for myself, or really thinkg about anything above the basic automoton level. It's a rough way to say goodbye to your youth: running from undergraduate level stuff to a professional graduate program full of people who lived it up when they were your age. Granted that's why they're there at their age and not my age. Still...but no.

504 was fun, packed as all get out, but fun. I'm glad that I'm done with it, because the whole thing was sort of like 3/4 of the JP semester crammed into one week. However, I now know that there is such a thing as metadata, that cataloging is NOT the career of choice these days if you want to actually be in a library, that public librarianship is big but you can only really catch a break if you enter as a children's librarian (and really, how many of those do you need in one branch?), that I have an odd ability to be a smartass and therefore show up people twice my age (whoopsy), and that this program is more disorganzied then almost anything TMC attempted.

Notes from the trenches...

2008-08-04T15:53:00.003-04:00

So I have 10 minutes until the afternoon lectures commence, and it's the first chance in two weeks that I've had a moment to blog.

I have found a new restaurant in Tucson that is worth the trip down here all by itself. It's an English pub called Frog and Firken and it's amazing. Google it.

Music libraries? Have no standard of cataloging and classification. The section that's not accounted for in the schemes? Recordings. Yes, you heard me, there's no room for recorded music in the music classification scheme.

I'm doing my issues paper on filtering, rather then my chosen topic, which apparently was too forward thinking. Look for my old topic to appear often in this space in the future.

I'm amazed that no one in class this morning could/wanted to define what the purpose of a catalog is. Oy.

I'm done on Thursday!!!! Back to Phoenix I go, armed with some new knowledge, but mainly the experience of a 'real live university.'

2008-07-23T15:09:00.003-04:00

I'm one week away from coming face to face with my classmates down in Tucson. If I said I wasn't scared, I'd be lying. I'm PETRIFIED. I remember a time when having 500 people is my class was normal. There's 75 of us in all at this thing, and I'm scared. I don't make friends easily or well, but I'll have to at least make some single serving friends so I can do the group projects-- though I feel the need to point out that the odds are in favor of knowing the people in your group in a work-related situation as opposed to them being total strangers.

I seem to have overestimated my ability to care about the work load too. I have a bunch of reading, a term paper, and an interview that I have to do. The thing with the interview is that I am shy as all get out, so it's a bit of a challenge.

Can't see the forest for the trees...

2008-07-20T20:30:00.003-04:00

So the first full week of Master's work is done. I'm about halfway through the syllabus with a week and half, two weeks to go. I feel pretty good about the odds of getting everything done, but I can't say that I enjoy it.

I like to have things challenge me. Even in my first semester at TMC, the America semester, I was challenged. I had read almost everything on the syllabus before, so that wasn't it. It was the works themselves, the professors, the environment. It made me rethink what I had and hadn't picked up before. My current reading material? Some of it is interesting, certainly, and some of it seems to be historically inaccurate. Some of the authors could benefit from a review of vocabulary and semantics-- I find myself too often thinking "I don't think that word means what you think it means." While I appreciate that the work I'm doing is far more technical and practically oriented, that's not to say that it should be inane.

Library Science is also the last place I expected to find ideology, mainly because of my own naiveté I will own, but there it is. There is more ideology in this course then I encountered in most of my courses at Thomas More. There is an overarching "Librarian power" message that somehow we should be open to everyone but to always know that we could, in fact, take over the world. There's truth to it, I suppose: if all the libraries and archives ceased to stock certain authors or certain books, they would likely disappear from the consciousness of the people. Let that terrifying thought sink in for a moment. There's an underlying advocacy of openness to certain viewpoints more then others: that because someone has suffered censorship in the past we must overcompensate, allowing them total freedom and punishing those who censored with... something like censorship. Again, I can't say this definitively because the whole thing is so poorly written as to send my brain into caterwamps. So, where do I go from here? I don't want to be the pompous ass in class that sits there and says "I once read in (insert famous or pretentious author here)..." At the same time, I can't just sit there while they say that the Catholic Church is a giant censorship organ that doesn't like education except for the secularized Dominicans and Franciscans. For starters, no, and for second secular? Really? And they left out the Jesuits. Say what you will about present day Jesuits, when the order was founded Ignatius was very much concerned with the education of his monks, and not just in the works of the Church Fathers.

It's all rather confusing. And everything is on e-reserves, and say what you will about the wonders of technology, sometimes I'd like to read it in an actual book.

2008-07-15T16:12:00.002-04:00

So, while I don't consider myself the biggest Wheadonite on the planet, I loved Serenity, really liked Mal and Firefly, and adore Buffy Seasons 2 and 3. So I'd say I'm a fan. Which is why I was intrigued when, way back during the writers' strike, I heard rumblings and grumblings that Joss got bored and penned a mini-epic-web-comedy-musical with Neil Patrick Harris and Nathan Fillion. I mention it only because today is the launch of Act One. All three parts will be streaming by the 19th, but they will disappear like a vampire in sunlight come the 20th. For the interested, the trailer is:

The streaming site (which is down at the moment, but should work internationally) is Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog. It's a singing Neil Patrick Harris. What more do you want?

2008-07-14T14:42:00.002-04:00

Another day, another dollar. Today is the first day of my independent study period. For the next year and a half, I will be attending the University of Arizona's School of Information Resources and Library Science to achieve a Master's degree. Sounds all manner of fun don't it? And for those of you scratching your head saying "School to be a librarian? Huh?" Yes, that's what it is, but it's so much more!

For starts, I have a good bit of reading and thinking and learning to do. My undergraduate work is both an asset and a handicap. I'm very familiar with the Thomas More Library, but that has little to no analogue in the outside world. I'm also familiar with relying on the written and published word, on readings that are tangibly held, on BOOKS! Funnily enough, in this program, I have very few books. It's enough to make my bibliophilic heart weep. So, in honor of this very scary foray into a more typical college experience, I re-christen this blog "Once more, With Feeling!" Yes, it's a reference to Buffy, but it's also a fairly good summation of what's running through my head at the moment. School again, but I have to put more feeling into it, because goodness knows they won't. I got spoiled by my little liberal arts experience. I knew my professors very well, and they cared what I did and how I did and when I sprained my ankle. Now? I've got to put all that care and concern in myself. No one will do it for me. How can you care about students that you see for one class and never again? If you see them at all, since most classes are online.

In other news, Starbucks has a new drink launch tomorrow. Ya'll should check it out. I don't think I'm allowed to say WHAT it is, but it should make the back side of the bar just soooooo much more fun. Hopefully it's good.

2008-07-02T13:38:00.001-04:00

What with the Fourth fast approaching, I give you... The Muppets. (sorry, won't imbed)

As for me, I will be working the Fourth. What's more American then selling people things that are slightly over priced, full of sugar and sort of like milkshakes in the middle of the summer?

2008-06-13T11:50:00.004-04:00

This is a quickie for those of you who find Europe intriguing. I don't want to be accused of being Euro-centric, but come on: these people are sort of fascinating and non-threatening (violence-wise) at the same time. That's certainly rare enough. Anyway, the EU had another draft of its constitution up for vote this year. Of the 27 member countries, only one threw the Constitution into a referendum style vote: Ireland.

And now 45% of the 3 million voters of Ireland are rejecting the Constitution. For starters, the people bitching about that being a sizable minority are right but should also shut up. Protesters of the Constitution from all 27 countries have been gathering in Ireland to make themselves heard on this. Ireland was just the only country who decided that the people should have a say on this. I understand that EU has been trying for a Constitution for years, but this one... I don't like it. It takes away the autonomy of the member nations. These are, after all, independent countries with independent peoples. These aren't states like in the US. Each of these is a COUNTRY. Reading over the cliff notes version of the treaty, they won't really be able to call themselves more then member states if this passes. I guess you can argue that if they subject themselves to it it's enough, but do they understand how much they're giving up for the sake of convenience? Clearly some people do: in addition to Ireland's very loud objection, the UK and the Czech Republic have legal objections that they want addressed before voting. And the UK and Ireland have the mother of all loopholes: they can opt in or out on any number of domestic legislative items. But the other nations can't.

Once again, my sourcing is limited to the BBC because they popped up on my news feed and I'm leaving for the airport in an hour to go to a classmate's wedding in lovely VA.

2008-06-07T12:51:00.005-04:00

So this started as a pity party, but now I'm getting riled about California. Would the liberals of California SHUT UP about you can't overturn the CA Supreme Court. They just invalidated the HEART OF DEMOCRACY AND REPUBLIC. I personally find that devistating, for me, my may some day exist children, for the future of this country. No one EVER thinks of precedent, of the two way street, of the fact that saying that the voters are wrong objectively is BAD.

For those who don't know, my thesis touched ever-so-briefly on the issue of the American judicial system, which may seem weird in light of the fact that it was about England and Arthur and myth, but trust me, the connection is there and the lack of it in practice is what's hurting us. Many argue this is about equal protection under the law, that the activism of the Courts is simply to ensure what is right. However, if this is right, then it will come to pass, and it will do so with the blessing of the people, or so the theory behind democracy as good government runs. For some the system is moving too slow, and that's bad. However, it's the inherent design of the system. It's ON PURPOSE. Why, you may ask? Because the founders worried about demagogues, about the passions of the people, about passion blurring reason to the point where some one is so centered on achieving the right that they will eviscerate the system to get it. A really really good, one that no one ever thinks of, is the Wiemar Republic.

Wiemar is, of course, the city in Germany where the German government of the 1920's and early 1930's was housed. Now, never forget that this was a people who was told by the rest of the world that they should shrivel up and die and fund the rest of everything in the process. The government was sort of set up for checks and balances, but the people felt so disconnected that the best supporters were the "reluctant republicans." Everyone else just ignored, or hated, or plotted. The disconnect between people and government was large, and troublesome. It opened the door to rhetoric, to people feeling they had to rescue themselves. Ultimately, of course, we arrive at the point where Adolf Hitler is ELECTED, in a fair (well, mostly fair) election. He was chosen-- most people forget that. All of this is to say that when passion takes over the system and puts it to use, you generally get bad things.

Bringing me back to California (if you're still with me and didn't yell "GODWIN'S" at the computer screen and leave), there is a system in place, and passionate people on BOTH sides of the issue are tearing it apart in the name of "the good." Ok, clearly only one of them can be right-- and that's AT MOST. My point is, the judges that voted no are not conservatives. On the contrary, most of them favor gay marriage. But they favor it being a measure of the people, by the people, for the people... have I heard that somewhere before? The issue at hand is not simply gay marriage (although it is there.) It is the furtherment of an agenda by a government agency that actively EXCLUDES the people from the thought process. When governments do that to people it usually ends in revolution. Although maybe CA will become that long promised island... Growing up in CA, your teachers always told you that "within ten years" (of what they never said) CA would be an island in the Pacific. So who knows.

2008-06-01T23:44:00.002-04:00

It's possible someone else has commented on this, but I haven't seen it, and it intrigues me. Hopefully someone more knowledgeable then I will look at this and analyze it. For now, you're stuck with me.

Apparently, in Minnesota, there is a Catholic Church that has banned a 13 year old and his mother from attending Mass. The reason? He's autistic, and the Parish Pastor has deemed him dangerous, disruptive, and a threat. Now, I understand that he might be disruptive, but any more so then any child in there under, say, 5? I had a different post up here before, but now I'm not so sure about any of this. It strikes me as wrong, because clearly the family still has an obligation to attend, and the mom is banned. It also seems like in this day and age there should be an option for autistic/disabled people the same as the signed Mass for the deaf. It seems like everyone in this situation is racing toward vilifying the other, and that, at the very least, is not Christian. Now, I'm obviously not qualified to speak to much of this, but it seems to me this is a lose-lose, for the simple reason that the government is now involved. Maybe the priest felt like he had to involve them to keep an actual danger away. Maybe the kid isn't quite a danger yet. I don't know. What I do know is that this is going to be bad-- for the priest, for the mom, for the kid, for the Church.

And so wags away a weary world...

2008-05-23T17:30:00.004-04:00

I hate blogger. Just ate my post.

Anyway, I have risen from the ashes and find myself in Phoenix. Hopefully this summer with go better, though the weather is not exactly up to a fabulous start-- 60s and rain the whole time I've been home. Being home, graduation has obviously happened and I have joined the ranks of Thomas More Alumni. Comps went well, A all the way despite being up until 5am the night before with food poisoning from morte mussles (they're on the verboten list next to the morte noodles now). The exam itself was easy, got out an hour and a half early both times.

And the party? Party is painting it a little strong to be honest. We went to Portsmouth, stayed in a little hotel, and hit the beach. Beach is painting it a little strong too. It was more of a rocky overhang, but it was beautiful. We got there just after the sun set, when the sky was all cerulean and lavendar and deep deep blue. Against the dark water and the rocky ledge, it was like some sort of painting or a little piece of heaven. I'm an ocean girl, I always have been. I hadn't been back to an ocean for over a year, and I was suffering mightily from it. The same way that some people need to be in a physical church building every week, or need to see the sunset, I need the ocean. That's not to say it replaces God, but there is something so magnificent in the deep blue that buoys my very soul. I wish we'd spent three weeks on Moby Dick. One and a half is just not enough; Melville is too complex, his images to indirect and precise in the same instant. Oh well. Such is the way of things.

After comps came theses defenses, which went well as well. Hey, I got to mention King Arthur, Monty Python, and make everyone-- even Mr. Shea-- laugh. My personal favorite line of the night? [regarding a border fence]: "I think we can be open to people and not be open to cocaine. I don't know, it's just a theory I have." In the driest of deadpans. Oh yes, that would be MY sense of humor. Mikey wins the day though: "Can America form an Arthurian character? Is Jimmy Carter going to come back to save us?" also in the driest of deadpans.

And then, graduation. Sure, there was two weeks between theses and grad, but I had an incredibly busy schedule of Chick Flick Tuesday, Gossip Girl Wednesday, and Buffy Friday. So yes, I totally did no work after comps. So it goes, it's time honored. I swear. Graduation left me wanting. It was so typical, trite, normal. My education, my time at TMC was so atypical, like being trapped in a real life character study-- everything is magnified and examined and reexamined. And graduation was... just like everyone else. Well, not totally. I was able to see the faces of certain of TPTB during the ceremony, and never have a seen more sour faces-- perhaps we interrupted their tee time. Then there was the moment we were told "Partings are usually sorrowful, but not really today. Out plz, k thx." by the administration. I mean honestly, how dare you say that to me in front of my parents on MY DAY? Perhaps he meant well, but it sounded so crass and mean I couldn't help but be upset.

There was a point in the graduation, however, that I will remember all the days of my life. Dr. Mumbach stepped down as dean officially on graduation, after 30 years. She wasn't scheduled, but she gave a small speech anyway. She talked about how honored she was to have spent those thirty years doing everything, how she couldn't even take all the credit because look at where they had lured the rest of the faculty from. It was from her heart, and she was tearing as she said it, and when the juniors jumped to their feet in a thundering ovation everyone followed suit, and then she really did cry. We joke about her lectures, complain about her style,wonder what she was thinking sometimes, but we do love her, and I don't think she quite realized it. So I'm glad we gave her that.

So now home, and Starbucks, and Library Science. At least it's distance learning-- I will finally come up for review and get a raise! Maybe I can make shift, we'll see. I don't know that I really want to be a shift though. I feel like the go to barista-- I'm one of the only people who doesn't have a "zone"-- I bop around everywhere in the schedule. So we'll see.

Also, I don't care if he's my senator, I'm not voting for McCain. Not voting for Obama. Not voting for Hilary. I can't aid and abet any of these people in their quest for the White House. Ugh.

2008-05-11T12:53:00.003-04:00

My, I've been away for a very long time. It's the nature of the beast that is TMC: it sucks up your life. Thesis presentation and defense was last week, comps the week before, full thesis two weeks before that, term paper last Monday, and a presentation tomorrow. But hey, they're being nice to the graduates.

Commencement is a week from today, and that scares me like nothing else. I've been in this little green world for four years (it's literally green now-- Spring finally made an appearance). It's hard to let go because it's so imminently comfortable, and I'm finally at the top of the heap, and now I have to go (If I had a dime for every time someone has said "Hurry up please, it's time" in the last two weeks I wouldn't need loans for grad school.) I suppose it's time to leave, and believe me, we've reached the point where for my own sanity I cannot be here any longer, but that doesn't make it easy. This is actually the first time I've been able to complete a program at the same school I started at. It's an interesting feeling. More interesting is the idea that I'll be an engaged bachelor in a week's time.

I'm purposely avoiding discussing the myriad of nasty things that have happened here in the past weeks. I don't want to think about it; I'm leaving in a week. The thing that pains me most is that I've hit the point of not caring. I can't let go and I have already all at once. People who are staying past next week are screaming blue murder about this that or the other thing and all I can do is shrug my shoulders. Am I being politic on purpose? Perhaps.

As an aside from the real world, Real ID has been extended to Jan. 2010, which means that everyone could still get on planes this morning. So yay for that. Boo for the thing not flatly being canceled yet. As always, Realnightmare.org has the articles and such. Another good website is the National Conference of State Legislatures Countdown to Real ID. They have links, facts, and figures to please even the most stubborn of modern men ^_^.

Friends, Romans, Countrymen...

2008-03-18T12:54:00.003-04:00

Oh politics, you rear your ugly head at me again... this time, it's Obama's speech on race in America. For the record, two things: I do not currently identify myself as Republican or Democrat, regardless of my registration. I think of myself as a moderate (you know what they say, all things in moderation...). Second, I think Obama is a wonderful orator. He has cadence, measure, charisma to burn, posture, grace, and erudition.

Now, the speech. For starts, I think Hilary is pretty finished. The speech was what people want from a politician: someone to stand there, look good, deliver lines with a shred or more of conviction. Never forget that politics is show business.

One nitty gritty point: I think the beginning, which was intended to be strong, muddled the Constitution and the Declaration together into an abominable wreck. I'm a student of the Constitution... I've studied it almost continuously for the past year, reading and rereading the commentaries, the document, the convention, the writers. I think most people forget that those two documents were not written in strict succession, and I don't think it was helped by the opening. I also don't agree that the founders ever thought that the Constitution, and the country by extension, were ever supposed to be perfect. Just 'more perfect': more perfect doesn't mean perfection, it means better then the union we had under the Articles of Confederation, better then the union of the Empire, better then any nation before. It doesn't mean that we can ever attain a level of perfection, but that we should strive for it. I grant you, that's what Obama said at the end, but not at the beginning. So that bugged me.

Strong points:

tying the pastor to his white grandmother --it showed that he is considering his experience-- multi racial-- as a microcosm of the American experience, and that he is trying as hard as he can to take race out of the equation.
tying the black experience to the white experience to the immigrant experience-- because it showed a consideration for problems that are universal, or that are rooted in particulars other then race
focus on education-- a return to an actual issue from the "race card". A lot of Americans care about education, and to be able to go "Schools that are predominantly Black suck, so do other schools. Let's fix it!" will stick in the minds of the listeners.
Hope and Change!-- a worn record, but slightly re-invented by calling for a "different kind of campaign" which focuses on action instead of rhetoric.

Problem with any of this? We're still in the land of rhetoric. I cannot vote for him because, as a practicing Catholic, I cannot vote for a someone who does not seem to show any respect for life-- I grant you that he has half the equation (no death penalty), but euthanasia, abortion, "right to die"-- these are issues that bother me. For the record, it is far from our only point of difference. I do not agree with putting medicare in the hands of the government in any capacity (because do we really trust the people who can't get us through the DMV in less then 5 hours to get us to medical help in a timely manner? It's the same system to be based on you know...). I do not agree entirely with the education scheme-- taking a child out of the home almost immediately destroys the family, not strengthen it, and it's not worth it to improve reading levels. Education and family can co-exist, why destroy one for the other? Economics... is a messy field that I hate, but I'm not 100% on board there either.

The transcript of the whole thing is here. It's also on most every other news agency, so it's not hard to find. Analysis will be out in the next hour or two. For now, all I'll say is that the speech as a speech was perfect for the occasion, that many people will find it comforting, and that with oratory like that Obama can easily defeat McCain. I just wish I could vote for him. But I can't.

Thought bubbles...

2008-02-29T19:08:00.002-05:00

Thoughts over the last few weeks:

There is little better then a giant golden moon hanging low in the eastern sky. It is in fact better when it is peaking out from around the corner of a 18th century barn.

Politics really grinds my gears (a phrase that comes up a lot around school). Seriously. I know that it's important, I am political science/theory major after all. But I have had it with the American political system, if system it can be called.

I was accepted to grad school! Wee! I was actually the first in my class to receive their acceptance. So it looks like it's Catholic University of America in the fall, for Library Science and Information Studies. Hopefully this leads to museum work. I adore museums. But if I have to spend the rest of my life in a library helping people learn stuff? I'm ok with that ^_^

This also means that my wedding won't be for two summers-- 2010 ya'll. Mark it!

Apparently the Rome students have hit the point where they hate each other and want to hear from someone not their class. I don't ever remember that happening, but then, I didn't have many friends in the class. I hung out with everyone.

2008-02-10T12:54:00.000-05:00

Well, Super Tuesday has come and gone, and what we're left with is rather surprising. Certainly no one expected John McCain to come out on top. There are very few conservatives that I met that would vote for him. Apparently, the Democratic game plan is to paint him as a cronie of G. W. Bush's. How they'll do that, I don't know, but I'm assuming it involves magic, since, although I am no fan of either McCain or Bush, I wouldn't really put them in the same category. And Romney dropped out, which is unfortunate, because that was the "lesser of two evils" I was gonna end up voting for. Oh well. I'll just find myself a Bahamanian island to live on for the next 4-8 years.

Also, the Hollywood Writer's strike is finally nearing it's end, which is good news to those of us who crave TV as a small bit of escapism. Funnily enough, unions came up in political economy the other day, and the question of whether strikes were effective anymore was raised. The only one any of us could think of was the Writer's Strike. Unfortunately, people don't think that picket lines are serious within the union anymore. I don't know but that I can't justify paying a bagger at a grocery store 9 bucks an hour with a 401k, and I don't understand why people are actually threatened with violence for disagreeing (before you say I'm wrong and exaggerating, it's a real example from the grocery worker's strike in San Diego about ten or twelve years ago. I didn't give a damn at the time, I just wanted my stinking Oreos...) It's something that stuck in my head, because I wonder about organized labor every now and again. Starbucks isn't unionized, and while I'd like to get paid more then 7.20 an hour to make your drink, I know it's hard to justify it to anyone who hasn't done the job, and the benefits, had I wanted them, were really good, especially for a part time job. We got that without a union, and I know full well that it was because the unions swept through all industries in the 20's and 30's that the company didn't think twice before laying out a good benefits package. But I wonder, sometimes, if we out grow our secondary institutions, like unions. And I wonder if such speculation is even worth it, because, after all, it's the intellectuals that seem to start the wars. That's what I get for being immersed in the Enlightenment and French Revolution in humanities I guess.

Two other quick notes: This I'm just not sure about. I understand that the modern man likes his deep thought, when at all possible, in the quickest easiest form (just look at network news). But cutting the Sermon on the Mount out of your version of the Bible because there's not enough action? I'm wondering about the wisdom of that....

Other quick note? It's nothing really... I got engaged Friday night.

2008-01-23T12:49:00.000-05:00

I know I said I wouldn't be on again... I lied. I'm just thinking about my thesis and realizing that I have these grand plans... and I don't know if I'll be able to pull them off. I know I don't exactly have a large readership, but if anyone has any tips on completing a thesis while also carrying a full course load, doing 9 hours of work study, studying for comps, and applying to grad school, I'd appreciate it. Or, you know, your favorite song that helped you from going crazy during any point of stress or... anything.

2008-01-22T09:57:00.001-05:00

Well, here I am, once again. The last section of the race. At the moment the only think I really resent is the weather: I mean, it's freezing, pure and simple. Also, the Oscar nods came out today, and Across the Universe only got one. Now, I know they can't be nominated for any of the music since none of it is 'original' in the sense that it wasn't written for the movie, but couldn't they do more then costumes? Maybe visual effects, because it was totally an orgy for the eyes, if you will.

Aye, me, and here we go. I'm finishing grad school apps, so I won't be on here much, because there's also comps and thesis to think of. I know my readership of one will weep ^_^

2008-01-18T23:54:00.000-05:00

Certain events of late are driving me toward drink, and not in a good "a glass of red wine a day keeps the doctor away" kind of way. There are people who refuse to believe the truth, even when it's in front of them. More then that, they attack the bearers of that truth for the simple reason that they don't like that possibility, and the bearer is a tad artless. Nevertheless, there are times when I simply want to curl up and die. There is nothing good about the situation I walk back into tomorrow night, and to be frank, that wouldn't change if it were nothing more then thesis and comps. But the fact of the matter is that it's like walking back into an intellectual war zone, and that's just the student body. Rumors in general are worse this year, and the proctors are rendered more impotent then I remember from my underclassmen days. The whole situation stinks to high heaven, and there's nothing to be done.

I do not want to return
I cannot do work
I cannot think
I cannot eat that food
I cannot live in that building
I cannot stay with most of those people

And yet?
I will return
I will do work
I will try to think
I will choke down food
I will live in that building, and have to stay with those people.

Why is it that an undergraduate degree is war now? And why is it that with everything going on, I still know that I'm in one of the best situations going for an undergrad? After all, I'm guaranteed to be out in four years. But oh those last few months... Is it always like this? Do things that were once delightful always turn sour? And was it always like this, back even thirty years? I'm sure to a large degree it was, but still... I ache, I am weary, and try though I may, I cannot seem to force myself further. I have been sick since Christmas morning and working 30 hour weeks through it, where I must be the picture of chipper. It takes a toll on a body, any body, and mine was already worn clean through.

So why do I dread my journey so? Why do I start to tear at the thought of return? I'll tell you one thing: Dostoevsky is only part of it...

2008-01-18T15:08:00.000-05:00

I draw, some, though not much comfort from the fact that there is no real news for me to write about. Sure, things are happening: car accidents, plane crash, the murdered marine, kidnappings. But... perhaps it's the plight of the hyper connected 20-something these days. Nothing is really shocking anymore.

Perhaps the only thing looming is STILL Real ID. Now, while the government keeps pushing back the effective date, one of them is still in place: On May 11, 2008, you cannot use your state driver's license for "official business." This means travel as well as anything involving the government. Passports will basically be required for all states that are non compliant, and at this point, I don't know that there are any states that have been able to turn over their entire databases so that every driver's license is compliant. This means that all those people who are traveling for graduation HAVE TO have their passport. The exception to this rule is the rather sizeable population born before 1964.

I haven't been able to read more then the first few pages of the final report (it's 300 pages long and available here.) but it's worrisome. More then that, the NY Times has an article about it in which Chertoff recognizes that states cannot meet the May deadline, but that they're pushing ahead with it anyone. If anyone thinks that this isn't something they have to worry about because they're in one of the already non compliant states, think again. As of May 11, you cannot board a plane or train without a passport (oh for the days when you only needed that OUTSIDE the country). As of May 11, you cannot enter a federal building or federal land (including, to my understanding, any national park) without a passport or compliant ID. I imagine this will be a particular issue for those who live in areas that are technically overseen by the National Park Service, like the Freedom Trail in Boston.

I hope I've made myself clear: this is an incredibly important and fairly detrimental piece of legislation that was passed almost three years ago to no fan fare. It is about to affect millions of lives, and no one is paying attention. The attention is starting to gather, I grant you: most of the major papers in big Western cities have picked up the story, as well as the NY times. I only hope that people will open their eyes and start recognizing the massive headache that is coming there way.

2008-01-16T00:53:00.000-05:00

My baby brother is now 18 and officially an adult *sob*

Ahem, anyway... why do men feel that because a girl is working at a coffee place like *fill in the blank* and she smiles and wishes him good day that she must totally be digging him? I've not had this problem, I guess because I always have an air of the Italian woman about me (I call it the "come close to me and so help me GOD I will put my stilletto through your heart without stopping for a beat" look.) Unfortunately, not everyone gets to live in Italy for a semester or two, and American women (and men for that matter) are by nature and nurture a friendly variety of people. However, the girls at my work keep getting hit on by the skeeziest of old men, and it really puts a damper on things. For one, we spend the rest of the day bemoaning the down slide of society to a place where such action is socially acceptable, and that's just not fun. Beyond that, since when is a joke that increased sales tax is to pay baristas to strip funny? Oh, that's right, it totally isn't.

That said, I will miss my cohorts in coffee, caffeine, and crazy. The girls are fun and fun loving, and you actually get close to one another because what else can one do but talk on the slow mid shift. It's a camaraderie similar in nature to the brotherhood of Morons, though it's a completely different animal. School picks up next Monday, a thought I relish not at all. I should have some form of glasses by then (AHHHHH!!!!!). Part of me wants to show up with glasses and short red hair and go incognito.

Lovely, dark, and deep

2008-01-14T23:25:00.000-05:00

It's very odd. Of late I've been thinking in snippets of lyrics, songs and poems. I've always found a great deal of comfort in song, why I doubt I'll ever know. It seems to resonate with my soul somehow. What's more odd for me is the prevalence of poetry in my internal thought process. I can account for the random appearance of the Beatles in my thoughts: they play at work and the Across the Universe soundtrack has completely captured my fancy. It's the presence of poetry that I find odd.

I'm a poli sci major, not lit. Several people over the years have remarked on the oddity of that to them: sure it's my bent and I know it, but they figured me for a literature major. No one ever did tell me why. But when I think back to Rome I think in snippets of Wilbur: the Piazza di Spagna at sunrise, how ceremony never did conceal how much we are the woods we wander in (oh how that resonates with me even now, much to my chagrin). When I think of school I find random phrases half remembered from Writing Workshop winging their way in. And lately it's been Frost. Funny, really. I never cared for Frost. I found his meaning far too obscured in his New England particulars: what did I know of stone walls making good neighbors, or birch trees bent by ice storms, or woods of any type? I've only ever loved one Frost poem, and I've been in love with half a stanza of "Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening" since before I knew it was poetry: "The woods are lovely, dark and deep/but I have promises to keep/ and miles to go before I sleep,/and miles to go before I sleep." It's that woods bit that gets me every time. Lovely, dark, and deep: there's something so... I don't even know in it. And I always wanted to get lost in woods that way.

And the whole poem of his I liked? It sticks in my mind more then anything, especially when I think of school now:

We dance around in a circle and suppose
while the secret sits in the middle and knows.

I was told by my one Frostian expert friend that this little couplet of his was among the more overlooked of his writings, because it's too open ended and difficult. I suppose its open ended, but I love it for it. It's the only poem of his I can think of that doesn't have an ounce of New England imagery in it, and it hardly suffers from it. There's something so human about the thing, and if you ask me why I can't tell you, just like I can't tell you why Wordsworth's dancing daffodils send a thrill through my soul, or why Wilbur's Ceremony is so frustrating and true. I guess that's why people do literature as a major: because if you had the ability, why would you ever want that feeling to go away.

Belle and Sebastian!

2008-01-13T23:38:00.000-05:00

"If She Wants Me"

I wrote a letter on a nothing day
I asked somebody 'Could you send my letter away'?
'You are too young to put all of your hopes in just one envelope'
I said goodbye to someone that I love
It's not just me, I tell you it's the both of us
And it was hard
Like coming off the pills that you take to stay happy
Someone above has seen me do alright
Someone above is looking with a tender eye
Upon her face, you may think you're alone but you may think again
If I could do just one near perfect thing I'd be happy
They'd write it on my grave, or when they scattered my ashes
On second thoughts I'd rather hang about and be there with my best friend
If she wants me

And far away somebody read the letter
He condescends to read the words I wrote about him
And if he smiles, it's no more than a genius deserves
For all his curious nerve and his passion

I'm going deaf, you're growing melancholy
Things fall apart, I don't know why we bother at all
But life is good and 'It's always worth living at least for a while'

If I could do just one near perfect thing I'd be happy
They'd write it on my grave, or when they scattered my ashes
On second thoughts I'd rather hang about and be there with my best friend
If she wants me

If you think to yourself 'What should I do now'?
Then take the baton, girl, you better run with it
There is no point in standing in the past cause it's over and done with

I took a book and went into the forest
I climbed the hill, I wanted to look down on you
But all I saw was twenty miles of wilderness so I went home

I am so irrationally in love with this album, I don't even understand. I have to go out and buy more of their stuff because they're so... wonderful and European and mellow. It's fantastic. And so I pass it on as a little lightener for the day in the midst of snow and dark and such.

Also? GO CHARGERS!!!!!

2008-01-12T15:28:00.000-05:00

Well, Super Tuesday is almost upon us. Oh joy; oh rapture. I'm in Arizona, which means I'm part of the masses who will cast their vote on Feb. 5. Well, hopefully. I have to send for an absentee ballot (oh the joys of out-of-state undergraduate studies) and frankly I'm having a hard time getting up the energy to care enough to do it. Don't get me wrong, I understand that this is "exciting" stuff. I understand that this next presidential race is "pivotal": just like every other presidential race. Am I a fan of Bush? My goodness no. For one, he went along with that asinine Real ID scheme, which he should have sent back, money be damned. That, by the way, is pushing ahead like an out of control train. So, yes, I'm looking forward to a new President.

But seriously, these clowns? I can't find ONE candidate who I can vote for in any race other than lead clown in Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Baily Circus. Since when have politicians been stuffed shirts and talking heads, and since when has being a "true American" meant subscribing to an ideology, and yes I am pointing my finger at both sides of the aisle. Whatever happened to the common good? Because frankly, I think being the world's policeman is NOT our common good. If we're going to be truly international, then why is no one willing to say: Yeah, we're gonna sort of pull out of here and there are let EUROPE, with their UNION, start taking charge. Or, you know, the Red Cross in the African AIDS crisis.

Since when is politics a panacea? We went from a country built on a healthy, though not excessive, amount of distrust of think tanks and leaders who were distant, to a bunch of sheep. Yes, I'm pissed, and I'm pissed at every stripe of political activist and party member. I'm missing the days when a primary vote meant voting for the lesser of who cares, because it was better then evil and more evil and stupid. I'm tired of people on the East Coast acting like they know exactly how life everywhere in the country is (if that's true, then why are there no border police? It isn't because we're happy about an open border down here.) I'm tired of people on the West Coast dismissing everything that comes from the East Coast because it must be biased. I'm not sick of the Mid-West, mainly because I think they may have been too trampled to get their prejudices out there.

Maybe some of our founders were right: maybe their dream of a great and glorious federal republic just can't exist over such a broad swath of land. Maybe the political traditions of East Coast and West Coast are too divergent. Maybe we need to have federal republics by region that join to form a confederacy style union, like in Europe. I don't know that there's even an answer. All I know is that I cannot lend even my feeble voice of support to any candidate on my ballot, and that thought alone is enough to make me weep.

2008-01-08T21:58:00.000-05:00

I'm curious about the wisdom of current campaign strategy in New Hampshire. A large amount of the population is university students, myself among them. Throughout the fall, we the students of New Hampshire have been hit over the head with event after event after event: meet and greets, debates, question and answer sessions, and townhall meetings. I'm a fan: so many events allow voters a chance to actually meet the candidates, and that's the way that New Hampshire has always been.

Now we're at election day, and New Hampshire is still the first in the nation-- the first primary. As I said, I am a student in New Hampshire. I am their coveted demographic. I did not vote today. Why you may ask? Why, as a young person who will have their most important years affected by this next president, did I not vote today? After all, students are allowed to vote in New Hampshire elections with day of registration-- simply provide proof of enrollment in the form of a letter and vote. Why, as a woman, did I not attempt to prove that women's voices are not only the backbone and mores of society but also that they will be heard? Why, as a college student, did I not attempt to prove that the college age demographic cares, that we will have our voices heard? I have one very simple answer to this, one which many university students will answer:

I am still on winter break. I am not in the fair state of New Hampshire.

I want to know why not one campaign, not one news network, not one blog near as I can tell bothered to check the university calendars. For the record, here are the return dates on most of the colleges and universities in New Hampshire:

Daniel Webster College: January 16
Dartmouth College: January 7 (And you can't be mad at people for deciding that they want to not vote the second day of classes)
Granite State College: begins this week (Though not necessarily yesterday)
Keene State College: January 20
St. Anselm College (the site of the debates on Saturday): January 14
Southern New Hampshire State University: January 7 (Just like Dartmouth)
Thomas More College of Liberal Arts: January 21
University of New Hampshire: January 22

There are two, perhaps three universities that begin in time for their students to vote in the election. This is assuming that the students were A) On time for their classes, which, should anyone remember their college days, isn't exactly the norm. B) Able to get to the polls between moving in and attending class. Beyond that, the students just aren't there. Half of the state system isn't in.

This isn't to say that the campaigning has been wasted by any means. Rather, the numbers are going to show up in the oddest places, all on Super Tuesday. I just find it amusing that the 21 year old poli sci senior has figured this out while the political analysts and campaign leaders seem to have forgotten that, while the primary may have moved up, winter break didn't.

ETA: At least I'm not the ONLY one who noticed this: The Boston globe had an article that I imagine got a little buried with all the other primary info, but thank goodness it wasn't just me.

2008-01-07T23:18:00.000-05:00

Perhaps the funniest thing about the primary system is how into it everyone gets, and how upset people get that they don't get to vote in both. It's a PARTY election. It's a little aggravating because it's been coming up a lot, along with the scads of emails I get encouraging me to vote in the New Hampshire primary tomorrow. I appreciate that they want a high turnout and that, as a college kid I am the hardest demographic to get to vote. However, I'd need to be, you know, in New Hampshire to make that happen. *shakes head*

I've been thinking a lot about my senior thesis. I'm still really in love with the idea, which I guess is rare. However, I have NO idea how to go about researching it. I know I want to include Coke, Blackstone, Thomas More, Pufendorf, Badgeot, The Once and Future King, Le Morte d'Arthur, and Magna Carta, as well as the 2003 Parliamentary Bill that was a list of the top 20 English common law documents ever. It's there that I have issues. I'm considering Joseph Campbell for his work on myth, and I'm pretty sure Voegelin has stuff too, and I'm sure there's a bunch of commentary; after all, this is the second oldest law system in the WORLD after the civis juris of Justinian (Roman law). But how do you find the good stuff? The library is woefully deficient, and not that many people I know actually know what common law IS, let alone who's good on it.

I guess in the end, this thing is becoming three fold in purpose (oh dear...). First, to show that English common law, itself a wonderful system that has worked for a long long time is too bound up with the English political myth and ideal to be successfully transplanted outside of England. Second, that the common law is so versatile that it has gone through ALL of Aristotle's good governmental phases with little time spent in the three bad ones. Third, it's a justification of the "peculiar institutions" that exist in American law-- like that pesky stare decisis people abide by in court decisions. Oh dear, this is gonna be a tome and there's no way around it.

2008-01-03T14:43:00.000-05:00

Oh another day, another dollar. I'm back at the Sbux, slinging coffee like it's going out of style, and ruining New Year's resolutions one at a time despite our new standards and "resolution drinks" (For example, the "Skinny Latte" lineup-- non fat milk, sugar free syrup, no whipped cream, and, as an added bonus, any residual joy has been removed. It goes straight to your hips you know.)

Beyond that life is as it ever was. I take the GREs on Saturday and then begin reading for my Senior Thesis. Before I knew I needed to take the GREs I was gonna write my whole thesis over break (it's so do-able!) Sadly, that's fallen by the wayside in the clouds of forgotten math and skills that I will rarely if ever need again. Aye me.

A Christmas Rose

2007-12-25T14:45:00.000-05:00

Oh Christmas morning... it was a good one this year. Lots of laughter and jokes. Sure there was some drama getting here, but hey.

I didn't get to leave NH until Dec 22, the day before my dad's birthday. The airport went as well as can be expected, and Sunday was so full of odds and ends and running around and insanity that we found ourselves at 5 pm without a dinner for my dad's birthday. That's when the Christmas miracles started happening. In the space of 2 hours we were half way through a "thrown together" surf and turf dinner of puff pastry wrapped steak with sauteed mushrooms and onions, smoked salmon on toasted french bread with cream cheese and capers, and a shrimp cockail. Not to bad for a day's work. Oh, and a tiramasu birthday cake.

But my real Christmas miracle? Last night, when we were rushing to put everything together and we took a step back and realized there was no center piece. I went and harvested our bounty of oranges and lemons and put them into a little basket and that's when I spied it: the most perfect, big fushia colored rose, perfectly round and untouched. We hadn't done anything to the rose bushes in weeks. It's rare for these ones to bloom much in December as is, yet there was a Christmas rose to tuck into the basket with everything else, a crowning glory over it all.

Roses always make me think of love, and all the love that surrounds this time of year, and the dirth of love in some of the things at my school, and the glow of the five of us girls in our "apartment" of a common section with our yellow walls and Christmas tree and silliness, and how we made up for all the bad that was existing outside that tiny space.

My love to you all.

2007-11-28T18:24:00.000-05:00

First things first: in theory, judicial review does not violate the Constitution. The whole point is that the judiciary is calling a law by Congress not just bad, but not a law at all, as it is in violation of the supreme law of the land (read close, and you'll see the caveat: 'laws made in pursuance of the Constitution'). On the theoretical basis, they're simply calling a spade a spade. So there! (I hate theory debates. No one ever gets it)

Second things second: Real ID, that glorious government program that I doubt would have been approved by the people (speaking of Judicial review, I want to see the many and varied cases that could get brought against this particular act...), may not go into effect. At least, not any time soon. Realizing that, no, you cannot get the entire country re-ID'd by the time graduation rolls around, they pushed back the date and lessened the threats. May I just add that state IDs should be left up to the STATE, not the federal government. I admit I'm a bit of a state's rights girl (subsidiarity for the win), but I think even those in favor of a strong national government can see that a state ID, paid for by the state, and issued by the state, should be designed by the state. A national ID already exists: it's called a passport. This whole thing gets my goat because it really affects travel. It's hard enough flying these days without the hassle of having to get a passport for domestic travel. In some ways, this is all a little too "Utopia" for me (Thomas More's Utopia; excellent commentary on the beginning of the end of good government-- wherever it may be)

2007-11-21T23:23:00.001-05:00

Thanksgiving is tomorrow, and my family plans this year are the kind of insane that only we can cook up. However, before everything gets lost in hustle and bustle, two links and commentary:

First, the just plain interesting. Archaeologists have found the cave of Romulus and Remus. This is cool to me because I spent a semester in Rome, studying and living. Also, I'm Italian, and was born and raised with a very firm grasp that, not only was I Italian, I was a Roman born, going back to time immemorial. The empire, the laws, the history, the glory all lay in my direct bloodline. It's heady stuff, that. To find the cave... well, while the saying may be "if it's not true, it's to the point," finding the sacred place for the first Romans is amazing. I mean, I know Romulus and Remus and their story and Aeneas and his, I've read the Aeneid in Latin for goodness sake. To know that this place of myth and legend and glory and power EXISTS, in time and space, under the ground I walked on, is amazing.

Second, the interesting and politically charged. Scientists say that they can change skin cells into stem cells. This is a boon because, while there have been stem cell alternatives to embryonic stem cells for a while, this is a personalized stem cell, which does away with the threat of rejection. Aside from that, it's amazing that science has progressed to this point. Scary, in fact. As someone who is pro-life in all aspects, I have to praise the work of these scientists for coming up with an alternative that does nothing but create, and hasn't an element of destruction in it. It's sort of exciting. At the same time, it's scary that humans have taken this power into their own hands. It seems god-like: to mutate one cell into another, even if it is through scientific means. It will certainly stir debate, but debate is good. Something with so much potential to improve the quality of life shouldn't come at the price of new life.

And with that, I wish you all (if there are any of you...) a Happy Thanksgiving! Don't get trampled on Black Friday if you venture out, and enjoy your time with your family if you stay in. I'm sure there's football to be watched. ^_^

Link Roundup

2007-10-28T12:52:00.000-04:00

Real quick link roundup, mainly on the stuff that's near and dear to my heart:

Update on the status of the California fires, including a map from BBC so you can see where each fire is. FEMA, by the way, is the epitome of fabulous. They faked a news conference on the fires on Tuesday. Gave no notice to the press so they had their employees pose as reporters and give them questions that were, shall we say, less then impressive.

In other, slightly more happy/geeky news, a copy of the Koran sold for 1.1 million pounds sterling (that's about 2.2 million US dollars, give or take...). Why so much? It's from 1203 and written completely in GOLD. Yes, GOLD. Marginalia in silver. It reminds me of a little news item I saw a few weeks ago... when Ross Perot decided it was a good time to sell a little document called the MAGNA CARTA. Isn't that insane? It was the only copy of the Magna Carta in America. And why should we care about some old document that was the first codification of the rights of men against a tyrannical king? Well, aside from the obvious it was the basis of our own constitution.

Speaking of constitution, it's what we're doing this week in state and local. AGAIN. I'm as much in love with the Constitution as the next history geek, but this is the 6th time in 4 years, and it's not like we're going in depth, which would make it worth it...

And we all go mad slowly...

2007-10-26T16:10:00.001-04:00

NaNo! (clap! clap!) WriMo! (clap! clap!) Screw the Federalist, Marx, Shakespeare for the reading and analysizing! Forget all my assignments! NaNoWriMo begins Thursday (which is scary because that means its, you know, NOVEMBER already!)

I have a fairly firm idea of this year's undertaking. I'm not even hoping to finish, just to beat my best effort, last year's 25,000 words (half way there!)

In other news, I'm working on my applications. Pray for me all! These things are scary.

2007-10-26T11:17:00.000-04:00

I never have, and I never will, understand how some people can wake up in the morning when facing something horrible, like cancer in themselves or a loved one, and feel like they've failed in not greeting the day as joyfully as usual. I can't ever greet a day with joy, and these people... these people who could walk through glass walls with the power of their faith and never be scratched... they amaze me, and they make me wanna be a better person.

Amazingly, half the time I've been at this school, they've been my roommates.

We're all going to hell so deliciously...

2007-10-22T12:39:00.000-04:00

Well, California is on fire again. 4 years to the day of the last bad fire, the Ceder Fire, which was within 5 miles of my home. Five miles may seem like a lot but for a fire it's nothing: remember, flying embers! Ceder was devestating: it wiped whole towns off the map. They're saying that Harris and Witch will be worse. I guess I should be mildly glad that my Aunt Evie passed away this past spring, or she'd have to evacuate, which would have been nye on impossible.

In other (even more depressing) news, the dollar hit a new all time low against the Euro. My dreams of going to school in London are looking bleaker and bleaker... and Trinity is probably right out. The new Dollar-Euro figures are close to the Dollar-Pound figures from two years ago, which is absurd for major currencies. Ye gods.

2007-10-19T13:07:00.001-04:00

Right, so... I'm less then consistant. As I have no readership this should be a non issue.

Link Roundup!
Joey Bishop and Deborah Kerr died! Joey was the last of the old Rat Pack still alive, and as a girl raised on Sinatra and Martin et al, I'm a little sad. Deborah Kerr, of course, was Anna in the King and I, among many other roles. Moment of nostalgia for Old Hollywood when scandels were done properly and stars didn't make fools of themselves and always looked fabulous...

Apparently New York wants to use federal funds to pay for a museum commemorating Woodstock. I don't know exactly WHAT I think about that.

And because I can never harp on it enough, the Real ID thing. The standards for real id are coming out soon. I didn't really get a chance to puruse it totally-- at your lesure. The thing keeps getting pushed back, and funding keeps getting cut off. I just hope someone brings it up as the race to the primaries heats up.

2007-09-29T00:43:00.000-04:00

Clearly, I am back on the East Coast, and clearly I haven't a lot of time. I'll come back to this post in the morning, as there is more then one thing I want to link to. Think of that-- my first linky post!

For now, I leave you with the question: is liturgical art necessarily different then great art? (ah lecture nights...)

2007-09-04T13:06:00.001-04:00

Well, summer's basically over. I have to pack, and I need to finish so that I can get some sun. The sun here tans you so much quicker then the sun out in New Hampshire. I suppose it's because the sunlight in New Hampshire is so much older. Don't ask me to explain it-- it just is. Even the first warm days of spring feel older because of the way the light plays. The light out here is so young and fresh and exuberant. It almost pays for the way it sears into your skin in 30 seconds, making you flush uncomfortably.

I guess it's because there are trees back there. Real, old, trees. I was raised with pepper trees and eucalyptus trees and palm trees and the old coral tree that hunched in the corner of my yard and bore the most exotic crimson flowers. And back east-- all the trees are old, and they have actual leaves for shade, that change colors and such. I still miss my pepper trees and the coral tree and the bottlebrush tree, mess though it made. And the Rose of Sharon-- I miss it most. Such a delicate little tree, even though it was nearly 50 years old-- sort of the opposite of Miss Havisham I guess.

Now I'm just babbling for no reason. I should be packing...

2007-09-01T13:12:00.000-04:00

It appears that this little blog will be used once again, probably as my main blog. I was over on livejournal, but the servers have been shaky of late, and people are getting edgy, and it's changing the entire environment. Whereas, here, I never really felt that I was part of a community. It was literally just my little blog for my own little doings.

Which reminds me...

If anyone out there stumbles upon this blog, I would have you think that I really do care about more then just song lyrics and pretty things. This is why I'm pointing everyone to this link: Real Id Nightmare. Anyway, what it amounts to is a giant database of everyone's vital information. It's a little scary. I think everyone should read up on it, find out what it is, and then, if they decide it isn't quite the good thing some people think it is (For the record, it was legislation facing opposition on BOTH sides of the aisle), then pass the info along. A good number of states are already exerting their rights as states (ah, the federal republic at work... I love it!) and refusing to allow the federal government to control state ids. It's a very quiet piece of legislation over all, but everyone should take note: it becomes active next May, and, if you reside in a non-compliant state, then you will be required to have your passport to enter any federal building, national park, or fly commercial. (Link is to the CNN story on Real Id).

away wags a weary world...

2007-08-30T21:13:00.000-04:00

Away wags a weary world... aye me. I have less then a week left here in AZ, and, much as the summer has sucked, as with all things, I become nostalgic as it ends. My, wasn't that an awesome amount of commas for one sentence? Anyway, I'm now officially 21, which means next to nothing to someone who doesn't drink and who can't afford to play craps, blackjack, and poker as she wishes. I'd worry about receiving much in the way of alcohol related stuff, but first I would have to receive ANYTHING. I don't mind really. I got a gift card from my grandparents, and a trip to Vegas/dinner of the BEST PRIME RIB EVER!!!!!!!!!!/a 22 year old port from my parents, and really that's enough. Lest people think poorly of my boyfriend, he's saving it until I get back to NH.

My senior year... not looking forward to it, for my own reasons. I'm notorious for keeping my own council. I am looking forward to my senior thesis though, so long as Dr. Sampo approves my topic. I keep talking like he has, but I assumer he will: political myth and Aristotle? How can he say no...

2007-07-04T21:21:00.000-04:00

"All men are, by nature, equal and free: no one has a right to any authority over another without his consent: all lawful government is founded on the consent of those who are subject to it: such consent was given with view to ensure and to increase the happiness of the governed, above what they could enjoy in an independent and unconnected state of nature. The consequent is, that the happiness of the society is the first law of every government." ~James Wilson, Considerations on the nature and extent of the British Parliament.

Because quoting Jefferson has become cliche, and because my boy JW said so 10 years earlier.

2007-05-29T19:10:00.000-04:00

Ok, I'm watching that thing on the "Star Wars Legacy" on History Channel. And? They compared Anakin's turn to the Dark Side and Padme's broken heart with Dido and Aeneas's leaving Carthage. Because obviously the fact that they were both sad over men leaving is far more important then the fact that Anakin kills all the younglings and becomes teh ebil, whereas Aeneas was actually following the will of the gods and had to establish, you know, Rome. I'm missing something, right?

2007-05-18T21:23:00.000-04:00

I cannot even begin to express how much I miss good tv, and by that, I mean smart tv, and by that I mean mainly the West Wing, like seasons 1-4, because on what other tv show do you have a leader figure conducting an angry conversation with God off the cuff entirely in Latin? or the pitch perfect play of language that is affectionately known as Sorkinese? Or pilgrim detectives?

2007-05-17T17:53:00.000-04:00

So. The school year, she be done. It was... interesting. I'm still trying to wrap my head around the fact that the seniors are graduated and no longer at the school. And it's not working. That class has been there since my freshman year: people come and go, but they are always there. I met over half of them when I visited-- I still remember. TMC without them, with just my class at the helm... it's verging into scary. This is not your ordinary school-- think like small small high school and voila. "My" sophomores are gone, and it's sad. I miss them all horribly.

And I miss my class too. They're the craziest bunch of people, and I love them all to pieces. Hooray for weddings, right? Because it's likely the next time after the spring that i will see all of them together. Le sigh.

And I miss my sweetheart, my love. I miss him most of all.

On a plus note, for the first time in two years, all the juniors passed their jps, and I've only heard of one grade below an A!!! As Rohit proclaimed after Thalia passed (she went last). "We are the SHIT. We f*$king ROCK." Indeed.

2007-04-17T21:24:00.000-04:00

Out of everything I've seen (which is admittedly not that much) about yesterday's shootings at Virginia Tech, this must be the saddest.

It's taking me back to my freshman year of high school, when two schools in San Diego got shot up and OLP went all crazy trying to prevent it happening to us. Not fun.

2006-05-27T20:33:00.000-04:00

She said to me, "Go steady on me.
Won't you tell me what the Wise Men said?
When they came down from Heaven,
Smoked nine 'til seven,
All the shit that they could find,
But they couldn't escape from you,
Couldn't be free of you,
And now they know there's no way out,
And they're really sorry now for what they've done,
They were three Wise Men just trying to have some fun.

"Look who's alone now,
It's not me. It's not me.
Those three Wise Men,
They've got a semi by the sea.
Got to ask yourself the question,Where are you now?

Really sorry now,
They weren't to know.
They got caught up in your talent show,
With you pernickety little bastards in your fancy dress,
Who just judge each other and try to impress,
But they couldn't escape from you,
Couldn't be free of you,
And now they know there's no way out,
And they're really sorry now for what they've done,
They were three Wise Men just trying to have some fun.

Look who's alone now,
It's not me. It's not me.
Those three Wise Men,
They've got a semi by the sea.
Got to ask yourself the question,
Where are you now?
~"Wisemen," James Blunt

I heard this song in the last few weeks of the Rome semester. I sang it as I did things I shouldn't have. I sang it through Europe: on the plane, in England, in Ireland, all the way back home. I asked where was I now? And it stuck with me. It continues to.

2006-05-19T13:25:00.000-04:00

"Why are there so many songs about rainbows?
And what's on the other side?
Rainbows are visions,
but only illusions,
and rainbows have nothing to hide.
So we've been told,
and some choose to believe it,
But I know they're wrong, wait and see

Someday we'll find it
The Rainbow Connection
The lovers, the dreamers, and me

Who said that every wish would be heard and answered
when wished on the morning star?
Somebody thought of that
and someone believed it,
and look what it's done so far.
What's so amazing that keeps us stargazing?
And what do we think we might see?
Someday we'll find it,
the rainbow connection,
the lovers, the dreamers and me.

All of us under its spell,we know that it's probably magic....
Have you been half asleep
and have you heard voices?
I've heard them calling my name.
Is this the sweet sound that calls the young sailors?
The voice might be one and the same.
I've heard it too many times to ignore it.
It's something that I'm supposed to be.
Someday we'll find it,
the rainbow connection,
the lovers, the dreamers and me.
La, la la, La, la la la, La Laa, la la, La, La la laaaaaaa
~Rainbow Connection

For some reason, that song always gets me.

The Beautiful changes in such kind ways.

2006-05-14T10:30:00.000-04:00

I have returned from the other side of the pond. I have explored Rome, Florence, Venice, London, Edinburough, York, Oxford, Liverpool, Dublin, Cork, Ireland in general. I have wandered those streets, all by my lonesome. I have wandered them with friends. I have explored the cities as I explore myself. I have come to conclusions and re-conclusions. I have broken away from my parents, probably for good and all. I have broken from the mold that people force upon me. I try to ignore that constant ghost, the shadow of what I should be. She hovers, that unkindly spectre, she hovers over me gently nudging me to become what I am expected to be. At the same time, another spirit hovers over me. She is who I want to be. It is she who also points me in other directions, sometimes the same directions as the spectre. But somewhere between the two I wander, along the rough path I have chosen.

I am watching the school video. It makes me miss the school, because when the idea works, it works so wonderfully. And the school does get into you, under your skin, into your eyes and ears and brain. I actually want to go back, I want to trade Rome stories with people in the caf on a rainy afternoon sipping on tea as I wait for my majors class. I want to walk through campus and say hi to everyone who wanders by and actually know who they are. I want to go back and hear all that music and talk, and the stupid humanities humor, and joke about latin verbs. I mean, who does that? No one but the Thomas Morons. I want to go back and write more for the paper. Teddy'll let me. How does that work always get done? You spend time talking and laughing and watching stupid movies and making crappy jokes and making sugar runs and yet you make the deadlines. It's funny, really.

2005-09-06T20:23:00.000-04:00

I am crawling out of my skin. I don't like me anymore. I don't want to be me and all that goes with that. I don't want this walk, this talk, this attitude, this family, this school, these people, this life, this me. I want it all to vanish. I want to be someone I'm not. I want to have short red hair and sparkling green eyes, I want to be thin, I want to be tall, I want to be less sensative. I'd be an editor of a fashion magazine, one of those people who can enjoy a party and wish it wouldn't end instead of being one of those people who has never been to one because she's too frightened to even contemplate the idea. I want to indulge in equal parts virtue and vice instead of being a dumpy, down, sad excuse of a person. I want to either be a person of faith or not, but just make up my damn mind one way or the other. I want to break free.

2005-08-26T18:17:00.000-04:00

I'm not a happy chica. The night ticketbox girl just called in sick for the rest of the series and there isn't anyone to call. Who you gonna call? ~~Ghostbusters!~~ Me. Of course. Who the fuck else? Especially since I'm cheap and I already know the Ticketmaster system. For the life of me I don't know why everyone thinks that Ticketmaster is a bitch, it's just propmt driven, like the old DOS os. I loved DOS. Ticketmaster is as easy as a 10 cent whore.

But seriously, who has to work their own damn birthday hawking tickets?!

2005-08-20T22:33:00.000-04:00

Oh man. I'm bad. But not. I've been in a bit of a daze all day. Between the cold I caught at work and the conversation that keeps reverbing through my head from last night, it's no wonder.

Today was a good day though. It really was. I slept through the night for the first time in a week, waking up after noon. Then I got to take the car into Arrowhead to go spend my gift card on something horribly frivolous. The answer, of course, is shoes. Bought a very cute pair; very 40s. Also bought some much needed underwear (I know you're all dying to know that.) Wandered through the mall and found some stuff at Torrid, but I need a second opinion, so Mom's going to come with me in the next day or two.

I tend to dream alot these days. Vivid dreams. Memory mearging with fantasy, fact with fiction, has been with hopes and dreams. Added to the already surreal bent my summer has taken, it makes things very interesting, but it doesn't manifest itself very clearly in the outer world. I dream, and I dream often, and, to quote one of my favorite books, I am "richer in those dreams then in realities; for things seen pass away, bu the things that are unseen are eternal." I do love Anne of the Island, it's such a sweet little book. Childish at times I suppose, but then oughten we all have some childishness about us?

2005-08-09T01:07:00.000-04:00

Threw you the obvious
And you flew with it on your back
A name in your recollection
Down among a million, say:
Difficult enough to feel a little bit
Disappointed, passed over.
When I've looked right through,
To see you naked and oblivious
and you don't see me
Well I threw you the obvious,
Just to see if there's more behind the
Eyes of a fallen angel,
Eyes of a tragedy.
Here I am expecting just a little bit
Too much from the wounded
But I see,
See through it all,
See through,
And see you.
So I threw you the obvious
Do you see what occurs behind the
Eyes of a fallen angel
Eyes of a tragedy
Well, oh well..
Apparently nothing.
Apparently nothing at all.
You don't
You don't
You don't see me
You don't
You don't
You don't see me
You don't
You don't
You don't see me
You don't
You don't
You don't see me at all
~3 Libras, A Perfect Circle.

I love that song. It doesn't sound as sad as it is, it really doesn't. I remember when I first heard it. It was back in February, probably. I was hanging out in the caf with the usual suspects, and Alex had his iPod. I swear that thing was attached at his hip. He'd been humming a song for a week or more, as was his wont. When he got a song stuck in his head, boy was it stuck there. Anyway, the song was "Weak and Powerless" also by A Perfect Circle. Well, I liked that so I went back to the beginning of the artist playlist. And the first song was 3 Libras. And it struck me right from the beginning. The intro is haunting in its beauty, and the lyrics struck me too, particularly the "eyes of a fallen angel,/ eyes of a tragedy" lines. Mainly, I suppose, because I always seem to relate to the fallen, the leftover, the tragic figure that isn't in a tragedy. The everyday tragic, like seeing a well used, well loved doll or teddy bear sitting on the side of the road, forgotten, forlorn, run over like yesterday's newspaper. There will always be the grand tragedies, the Romeos, the Juliets, the West Side Stories, the bombing victims, those who lose their lives for no rhyme or reason. But there are everyday tragedies too, the forgotten things, the overlooked things, the people who go about their business never looking up, never seeing the forest for the trees, never taking the moment to admire where the are, just trying to get where they are going. The people are forgotten by themselves, and so those who take the time to look around, to see the trees and the forest, who look at the city even though they know it is there, they are forgotten moreseo. Because the world passes by without a glance.

you won't get to see the tears I cry

2005-07-20T22:54:00.000-04:00

Is it odd to seem to relate to songs on the radio? I mean, to have some lyrics somewhere completly reflect what you're thinking or feeling? And I don't mean the whole "I love you like whoa" feeling that most fluffy pop songs have. I guess I'm just curious if it makes me a total loser to relate to a Kelly Clarkson song:

"I told you everything
Opened up and let you in
You made me feel alright
For once in my life
Now all that's left of me
Is what I pretend to be
Sewn together, but so broken up inside
'Cause I can't breathe
No, I can't sleep
I'm barely hangin' on"

I mean, kinda dark for pop music to begin with. I just, I don't know, I shouldn't be that way really. And I'm sort of not, it's just that I here that and I've been there and I know that, so it flashes me back, just a little bit. Does that mean I'm not over it or I'm oversensitive or just a fucked up girl looking for my own piece of mind? And is there even an answer? And why do I bother, spilling these thoughts out like a mosaic only to have them blow away like sand. Why do I do the things that I do?

Why do I do the things I do?

here i am, once again

2005-07-18T23:49:00.000-04:00

Okay, so, reviving my ooooold blogger account. I left it when my brother found it, wending my way to xanga, then to livejournal, then to myspace. I still have those blogs actually, but I wanted one that would function as a diary, one that wasn't seen by people I know. This isn't saying that you arn't allowed to read. Read, comment, enjoy, I more then welcome you. If you know me, however, realize that I am operating under the assumption that you are not here. This is me, unedited, unsanitized